Garlic's Promise

How strange it seems to be planting something while looking fall and winter dead in the face.  Years ago I tried to grow garlic - obviously before the great god Internet because I planted it in the spring and then stood over it wondering why the heck it never amounted to anything!  Today, of course, I would just "google it" and become instantly wiser.

My initial failure would be because I was planting it the wrong time of the year...who knew?

I'm sure that there would have been planting instruction if I had bought from a garden supply house.  But I suspect at that point in my "gardening" it was more of a point and shoot kind of thing:  buy garlic in the grocery store, put it in the ground in the spring and go from there.

Now that I am at least somewhat wiser (and definitely older) I not only buy from accredited sources but actually read the instruction/informational sheets that come with a product!  Amazing information to be found there.

It was a total polar shift when I found out I was supposed to plant the garlic mid to late October and that miraculously by the following July or August I would have lots and lots of....drum roll:  GARLIC!

So, as it is currently the middle of October it's garlic time.  I ordered the smallest quantity I could (a pound) and today was planting day.

A pound of garlic is actually quite a lot - ended up with 6 "heads" of garlic - each of which has to be broken up into all it's little cloves for planting.  Fortunately I have a friend who will take some so my garden next year won't be exclusively garlic.

I even followed the instructions that said to add aged compost to the bed prior to planting - my compost bins are finally starting to produce some wonderful compost.  For a while I thought everything I threw in there was going to retain it's original form and composition forever.  But time does indeed rot all things so I added several shovels of the compost to each of the two beds I planted today.

Put compost all along the middle of the beds and then spaded it in, smoothed it out and set the little garlic babies in place.

And, yes, I put in markers just because I can see myself planting something on top of them come spring and then wondering what those garlic looking things are.  Memory lapses are common at my age but I take it to new levels occasionally.  Anyhow, I marked the rows just in case, put the cloves in their assigned spots and then pushed them into the dirt.

Next step was adding a layer of mulch to protect them through the winter.  I will probably add more but this is a start.

It's eminently satisfying on a blustery fall day to tuck something into the still warm ground, cover it with soil and mulch and walk away secure in the knowledge that in the spring the cycle will continue and there will be garlic.

This has been a hectic summer for me in many ways.  Health-wise it was brought home to me in some not so subtle ways that an apple a day doesn't always keep the doctor away.  And it is quite possible for that same doctor to come up with some potential diagnoses that you never even heard of, never mind considered actually adopting as your very own.

So doing something like planting garlic which has the implicit promise that in the spring no matter what else is going on, the garlic will arise like a green phoenix out of the dirt is comforting.

Not to mention setting the stage for some kick-ass stir fries!